Eating a Baked Potato as a Soup Might Change Your Life

GET THE RECIPE HERE.

One of my favorite winter comfort foods is a baked potato. My mom wasn't the biggest fan of making baked potatoes while I was growing up (which shocks me because it seems like the perfect lazy solution for feeding kids), so ever since college I've capitalized on opportunities to eat them.

Ethan Calabrese

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Super bowl parties, potlucks, and cold weeknights are all perfect opportunities for baked potatoes—but what if you don't want to wait for them to bake in the oven...for a whole hour? Enter the workaround: Baked potato soup. You cook the potatoes in milk to avoid that whole roasting thing, which takes only 20 minutes or so, and then stir in cheese for a luxuriously thick, creamy texture. (Fact: After this, you'll wonder if you should always be adding a handful of shredded cheese to your soup broth. The answer is pretty much always yes.)

Ethan Calabrese

Then it's really all about the toppings. Anything you'd pile onto a baked potato is game here. I reverted to the classics—crumbled crispy bacon, cheddar, scallions, sour cream—but feel free to get more adventurous with corn, hot sauce, black beans, whatever your baked potato-loving heart desires.